Wednesday, July 27, 2016

Hillary Clinton’s campaign told Fusion that 2,887 of this year’s 4,766
DNC delegates are women. Black men and women account for 1,182 delegates
(compared to 18 at the RNC) while 292 are Asian American, 747 are
Latinos, 147 Native Americans, and 633 are LGBTQ-identified people. This year’s DNC has at least 27 trans delegates.

On the first night of the DNC, there were 18 black speakers last night. (Coincidentally, that’s exactly as many black delegates at the RNC - TOTAL).

Donald Trump continues his belittlement of anyone who he feels gets in his way. Epitome of the top of the hierarchy - it's all about me.

During a speech yesterday at The Hotel Roanoke, he suggested that the air conditioning was not working properly and suggested that they not be paid. Now negative publicity about the hotel is all over the news. The staff at the hotel say the air conditioning was working properly.

We have been many times to The Hotel Roanoke, a nice historic property just off the Blue Ridge Parkway, and hope that their reputation is not damaged. And we hope they get paid for their efforts, not like so many people supplying Trump with services.

Thursday, July 21, 2016

In an article published by NBC News, there are pictures of the legislative interns for the Republican and Democratic parties. Almost all the interns for the Republicans are white, and racial diversity with Democratic interns is clearly evident.

Republicans have a appeal-to-whites race problem which they obviously don't want to solve.

Wednesday, July 20, 2016

A smaller wall than he envisioned complete with American flags, tiny “Keep Out”
signs and tiny razor wire appeared around Trump's star on the Walk of Fame in Hollywood. Created by a street artist by the name "Plastic Jesus," it went up on Tuesday afternoon.

And as the article says, alas, Mexico did not have to pay for the wall.

Tuesday, July 19, 2016

People on top of hierarchies find all sorts of rationalizations to lie. Sometimes it is because they just can, or they want more resources than they currently have, or they want to convince others that they deserve to be on top and everyone else deserves to be on the bottom.

Donald Trump has been caught in numerous lies, but now it appears that his wife Melania Trump is made of the same cloth.

Last night in her speech in front of the Republican National Convention, she was found to have lifted parts of her speech from that of Michelle Obama in the same situation a few years ago.

Now apparently she also made up her college degree, in that she has said she has a degree in design and architecture at University in Slovenia, but her biographers say she dropped out her freshman year.

Tuesday, July 12, 2016

During Donald Trump's acceptance speech at the Republican convention, On the evening tha Donald Trump is expecting to be accepting the presidential candidate nomination from the Republican party, a coalition of gay
rights groups will run an advertisement that criticizes laws that limit which public restrooms
transgender people can use, like the one passed in North Carolina.

The minute-long commercial will run on Fox News during Mr. Trump's acceptance speech.

The New York Times is reporting that in its platform committee meetings, the Republican Party keeps going right, which in today's politics, means supporting hierarchies more and more.

Its staunchly conservative platform takes a strict, traditionalist view
of the family and child rearing, bars military women from combat,
describes coal as a “clean” energy source and declares pornography a
“public health crisis.”

"While public and legal opinion has moved steadily in one direction, the official declaration of Republican party principles appears to be heading sharply in the opposite direction." "The platform approved in committee on Tuesday is a text that can seem almost Victorian in its moralizing and deeply critical of how the modern American family has evolved."

Nearly every provision that expressed disapproval of homosexuality,
same-sex marriage or transgender rights passed. The platform calls for
overturning the Supreme Court same-sex marriage decision with a constitutional
amendment and makes references to appointing judges “who respect
traditional family values.”

As the primary political supporters of hierarchies in this country, the Republicans are certainly showing signs of being in a death struggle, as are many of the pillars of our hierarchical way of life.

In S.V. Date's article "Republicans Left Wondering if Donald Trump will Kill the Party or Just Maim It," he points out that Trump supporters harken back to a time when a high school diploma, and sometimes not
even that, was all that was necessary to make a middle-class living in a
country that was overwhelmingly white.

“What they want to do is go back to 1956. And it’s just not going to
happen,” said Mac Stipanovich, a longtime Republican consultant who
served as former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush’s campaign manager in 1994. “If
that’s who we are, then we’re headed for the ash heap of history.”

Monday, July 11, 2016

At the very popular Mississippi Street Fair in Portland, Oregon, car parking is at a premium. So drivers of 83 cars decided to park in the bike lanes. Bad idea.

A single city parking enforcement officer almost certainly paid for his
or her time at the Mississippi Street Fair Saturday, issuing 83 parking
tickets for $80 each to cars parked in Mississippi Street's bike lanes during the annual north Portland festival.

Drivers ignored the alternative transportation options suggested in this city that is serious about car-less travel. Highlighted on the organizer's website was the paid parking lots at two nearby schools, with proceeds
to benefit the schools. It also noted three temporary bike parking
locations and transit access via the Yellow High-Speed Rail Line and TriMet’s frequent
No. 4 bus line.

Oksana Chusovitina will be going to her 7th Olympics and is 41 years old, and will be competing in the women's gymnastics competition representing her native Uzbekistan. The Olympic committee has had to put a lower limit on the age of women who could compete, as the Olympians kept getting younger and younger.

This week, Bernard Lagat won the 5,000 meter USA Olympic Trails qualifying him for the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, his fifth Olympics. Lagat is 41.

Wednesday, July 6, 2016

Michigan tests low income people for drugs in order to receive benefits. In a pilot program, 303 people were tested and all passed.

Now Representative Gwen Moore has introduced an "accountability bill"
that would see top paid businessman privy to frequent tax breaks be
required to complete drug tests at random, similar to the provision that
mandates the same requirements for lower income welfare recipients.

Let's have those people on the top of the hierarchy be treated the same as lower groups they have power to control. Looks unusual, doesn't it, but a great idea!

Philadelphia archbishop Charles Chaput has decreed that Catholics who are divorced should not have sex with new partners if they are to remain in good standing with the Catholic Church.

"Undertaking to live as brother and sister is necessary for the divorced
and civilly remarried to receive reconciliation in the Sacrament of
Penance, which could then open the way to the Eucharist."

Here is a man who supposedly knows little if anything about sexual relations imposing rules on those who do. So typical of those on top of the hierarchy thinking they know more about the lives of those below and can make decisions for them.